"They were not traitors." The Governor of the Tula region and the former guard of Putin Alexei Dyumin - about Evgenia Prigozhin and Dmitry "Wagner" Utkin

The Governor of the Tula region, Alexei Dyumin, expressed his condolences to the family and relatives of the founder of the PMC Vagner Evgeny Prigozhin, the commander of the mercenaries Dmitry Utkin (call sign Wagner) and other people who died during the crash of the Prigozhin business jet in the Tver region.

Dyumin said that "their death is a great tragedy and loss for the country." According to him, Wagner's PMC “performed the most complex combat missions in the interests of Russia in different parts of the world,” including in Ukraine.

“I knew Prigozhin as a real patriot, a decisive and fearless person. He did a lot for the country, and his homeland will not forget him. We grieve for those who died in this disaster, for all the fighters of the Wagner PMC, which fell during his own . You can forgive mistakes and even cowardice, betrayal - never. They were not traitors, ”said Dyumin.

It is not clear what Dyumin had in mind, speaking of betrayal. Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin called “betrayal” and “treason”, the rebellion of Evgeny Prigozhin, arranged in late June. After the Prigozhin plane fell on August 23 in the Tver region, telegram channels distributed a video from an interview with Putin in 2018, in which he said that he could not forgive betrayal.

• Alexey Dyumin is a former guard of Vladimir Putin, the Governor of the Tula region since 2016. Dyumin and Prigozhin, as the Insider wrote earlier, were business partners. The head of the Tula region informally supported the head of the Wagner PMC in his criticism of the Russian Ministry of Defense, the sources of Medusa told . During the June rebellion of Wagner's PMC, anonymous bloggers said that Dyumin allegedly participated in negotiations with Prigozhin, but the Tula authorities denied this.

Listen to the episode of the podcast “What happened” about the political career of Dyumin and his connections with Prigozhin